Monthly Archives: August 2010

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Over at View from the Porch, Tamara’s got a bit analyzing comic book characters and why they don’t generally carry guns. She opines thusly:

I think that a large part of it is because guns are perceived as fatal. You can’t shoot people “just a little bit”.

Comic book heroes, by and large, do not kill bad guys; they tie them up and hand them over to the cops, at least metaphorically. If your hero had a gun, all he could do with it would be to shoot guns out the bad guys’ hands, and that makes him pretty much a one-trick pony, even worse than Aquaman…

Over at the website for “The American Rifleman” Ian Harrison has authored an article about what went on behind the scenes of Top Shot. Despite some of the reality show drama onscreen, it seems like the competitors got along fairly well.

Ok, you guys have been pretty patient with me, so here’s an update for the Hi-Point Throwdown. I attended our weekly Wednesday Steel Challenge match and ran the Hi-Point against an M&P. I’ve also secured a holster for the Hi-Point as well. Below are the results from the match:

11-Aug-10

1

2

3

4

Total

Triangles

5 To Go

Showdown

Plate

Rack

IRON SIGHT

1

Brian #2

8.77

10.1

8.6

10.89

38.36

2

Brian #1

11.37

9.97

7.71

9.39

38.44

3

Dennis

10.22

10.48

8.86

11.05

40.61

4

Rod #2

10.26

12.74

8.13

11.33

42.46

5

Rod #1

10.49

10.64

9.69

12.58

43.4

6

Jason

12.47

10.89

9.62

10.95

43.93

7

Paul

10.52

12.26

10.53

11.99

45.3

8

Justin M&P

10.56

13.42

7.69

14.32

45.99

9

Pat

13.18

11.86

11.91

14.69

51.64

10

Bonnie

14.01

13.14

10.69

14.93

52.77

11

Justin HP

14.57

13.93

11.97

13.08

53.55

12

Carl

15.75

16.88

15.83

16.55

65.01

13

Adrian

13.52

18.09

16.52

18.44

66.57

14

Curtis

9.44

35.91

10.73

12.74

68.82

15

Carl B.

21.6

18.04

14.01

18.51

72.16

16

Charles

19.63

25.61

14.22

26.52

85.98

17

Michael

46.4

31.06

23.68

26.88

128.02

18

Mark

51.86

57.14

42.32

46.34

197.66

The M&P had one stoppage due to a high primer (ammunition-related). There were none with the Hi-Point. Shooting the Hi-Point from a holster evened things up considerably. Drawing the gun feels a bit clunky, though the safety is placed well enough that it’s easy to sweep off as you’re presenting the gun to the target. The heavy trigger pull still doesn’t do you any favors, however.

For those of you who’ve picked this story up via the Hi-Point forums, welcome. I saw a couple points raised there about the test, so I’ll address them here:

Wouldn’t it be interesting to know what all the competitors were shooting

The division I shoot in is iron-sight. Most of the shooters are running either production-division type guns like Glocks, M&Ps, XDs, Beretta 92s,or single action semi-autos like 1911s. I don’t include the results from other divisions like Rimfire pistol or Open because they’re not really relevant.

Whats the mag cap on the 2 pistols? i was wondering if the c9 needed more mag changes which could cause the slowdown?

Magazine capacity isn’t that important in Steel Challenge. The stages are all pre-set and have no more than five targets. reloads are done off the clock between strings of fire. The 10 round magazines for the Hi-Point don’t put the gun at a noticeable disadvantage, unless I really happen to screw the pooch and miss a lot. At which point it becomes moot. In Steel Challenge, if you have to reload on the clock, you’ve already lost.

Note the brass hasn’t yet cleared the ejection port on the gun. I don’t know if this is a result of a lucky shot with the camera, or testament to how slowly the Hi-Point cycles.

BLAM!BLAM!

Two pieces of brass in the air at once. Pretty awesome. The camouflage holster is the one I’m using for the Hi-Point. Lest you think it screws with my draw, between strings, I rotate the outer competition belt to put the holster in the optimal spot for drawing.

As always, shooting stuff is a blast, and if you’re not already shooting Steel Challenge, you really should go find a local match to attend. It’s great fun.

Just a quick note to point out a couple new additions over yonder ———>

The Personal Armament Podcast is exactly what it says, a solidly produced podcast geared towards covering issues relating to security and personal defense. I have to say, I’m intrigued by the Ready Shot product they promote.

Guns and Tacos is a Houston Texas-based blog dedicated to reviewing the fare for sale at various taco trucks in the Houston, Texas area, with some gun nuttery thrown in for good measure.

Unlike pistols and rifles, shotguns seem to exist in their own little world. With pistols and rifles, there’s a fair amount of crossover in how they work. Trigger control, sight picture, reloading, internal mechanics (to some extent) and even the ammunition are not tremendously dissimilar.

Shotguns, on the other hand, are so different that in my less charitable moments, I find myself wondering if they should even be considered real guns. There’s no crossover whatsoever. You aim them differently, use the trigger differently, reloading requires a fair amount of dexterity in order to do it quickly*, and the ammunition comes in a bewildering array of configurations, all of it denoted with nomenclature that looks like it was dreamed up by some guy with a monocle and mutton chops. (Drams?! Gauge?! Ought?! SRSLY, WTF dood?!)

Further complicating this are the demands that modern 3 Gun matches place on shotguns. Shotgun-oriented 3 Gun stages can include all sorts of targets, including clays (aerial, rabbits, and static), steel plates for shot, steel gongs for slugs, and paper targets for slugs. On top of this, sadistic match directors can and will intermix all of those targets together, forcing the competitor to come up with a strategy to engage those targets in the most efficient order, and woe unto you if you screw up and drill a steel target that’s only rated for birdshot with a shotgun slug! (At RM3G, doing that is a $25 “donation” to the Junior program, and a 30 second penalty. At other matches, it means you’ve just bought yourself a steel target with a nice concave dent in it.)

Not that I’m griping. After all, the name of the game is 3 Gun, and the expectation is that you will have your skills and abilities tested on all three commonly available firearms platforms. But shotguns have special considerations, especially when it comes to firing different kinds of ammunition through them.

Which brings me to my biggest gripe about shotguns.

With birdshot, my fiber optic front rail is pretty well spot on, so long as I have a consistent hold and cheek weld, it’s perfectly adequate for moving and static targets.

But with slugs…

The fiber optic does fine to about fifty yards. Beyond that, it could best be described as barely adequate. My shotgun has a tendency to throw slugs low and left, which means that I have to compensate for it. For gongs at 80 yards, I’m holding on the upper right edge of the target. This is sub-optimal for a couple of obvious reasons:
– If my cheek weld is not consistent, it will result in a miss.
– Having such a drastically different point of aim means that I have to stop and think about how I’m going to engage the target, rather than just lining up the sights and pressing the trigger.
– If the target is a nonstandard size, I have to take a best guess approach to how I’m going to hold on it, press the trigger and hope for the best.

This is less than ideal, especially since the bigger 3 Gun matches are putting slug gongs out to further distances, with 70-80 yards becoming common, and 100 yards not unheard of. My understanding is that at Blue Ridge this year, they had half-size slug gongs at 100 yards.

So, I’m thinking some sort of flip-up or retractable rear sight is going to get added to my shotgun in the near future. It doesn’t need to be anything fancy, though. I’m leaning towards something like the sights you see on a Ruger 10/22 or Marlin. Roughly adjustable for windage/elevation, and can be flipped down out of the way when not needed. So long as I could zero it to be dead on at 100 yards, that would be the ticket.

I guess it’s time to put a call in with the gunsmith.

*Yes, I know about the Saiga, Molot, and XRail. However, I shoot Tactical Scope/Limited Scope, and any of those guns/accessories would put me squarely in Open Class where all the kids with the scoped/compensated pistols, dual-optic rifles, and mag-fed shotguns play.

Now, I’ll be totally honest. I have no interest in semi-auto pistol caliber carbines. Rifles chambered in pistol cartridges usually just elicit an uninterested “meh” from me. However, when they’re full auto, then you’ve got something pretty cool:

I’ve yet to see a KRISS in the wild, let alone shoot one at a range. Shooting one of the full-auto ones is something I’d very much like to do, and if Michael’s claim that it recoils like an American 180 is true, I can’t help but think that would be utter buzzgun bliss.